Site Update: BVOL24H, PGP, and Indices

BitMEX is proud to announce the release of another major upgrade to the BitMEX platform!

We have three major updates this week: the new BVOL24H contract, PGP email support, and UI support for backing indices.

BVOL24H – Daily Volatility

BVOL24H is now live. BVOL24H is a futures contract that allows traders to speculate on the Bitcoin daily historical volatility. The Bitfinex last price is snapped every 5 minutes, and then the standard deviation of the logarithmic change between snaps is calculated. That number is multiplied by the square root of 288 to arrive at a daily volatility. The increased sensitivity to short term price movements makes BVOL24H a great tool in a trader’s arsenal in the quest for alpha in these choppy and sideways markets.

PGP Support

Many of our traders are very serious about security, as they should be. But automatic updates from BitMEX regarding your deposits, withdrawals, and margin status may leak information to your email provider and other parties. While your email server should be using encryption, it is still very possible for emails to be read in transit.

If you are nodding your head in agreement, then you probably already know about PGP. If you have a PGP key, paste your public key into the box in the My Account page. You will be sent a test email immediately so you can check your configuration. From then on, all automated emails will be sent to in encrypted form.

BitMEX Indices

BitMEX contracts have always settled on indices that were generally only published via the API and viewable in limited fashion in the References section. For example, this is the page for .XBT30M, the settlement index for XBU24H.

We have moved the indices to the front page, where index prices are now viewable as a tab in the Instruments panel. Additionally, you can now view the Bitfinex spot price, updated minutely, right in the ticker bar on the top of the page! See the new section on the left side near the series selector.

That’s all for this week. Thanks to all of our traders for being here. Please contract us in the chat or find us on the Whaleclub Teamspeak if you have questions about BVOL24H or any of the new updates.